Dr. H.M. Wiseman
is a Senior Research Fellow in Physics (ARC QEII
Fellow) at the Physics Group, School of Science,
Griffith University, Queensland.
Apart from his research in Quantum mechanics,
Howard Wiseman has published articles about wide-ranging
subjects such as Population as an Ecological
Issue and History.
The latter includes his attempt to reconstruct
the history of the 5th and 6th centuries in
Britain in The
Ruin and Conquest of Britain, as well
as his studies int the Roman Empire, culminating
in a website about the ups and downs of the Roman
Empire over its entire (but especially its later)
history: Eighteen
Centuries of Roman Empire.

Vortigern Studies Index

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The
derivation of the date of the Arthurian entries
in the Annales Cambriae from
Bede and Gildas

Howard Wiseman

on
Vortigern Studies

1.
Introduction

The
earliest record of Arthur that places him in a precise (to
within a few years) chronological context is that found
in the Annales Cambriae (AC), the annals of
Wales. The first year of these annals corresponds to circa
A.D. 447, and, in the oldest extant versions, the last
entries are for the 950s[1]. Thus the annals were almost
certainly compiled as a single document at least as early
as the mid tenth century. Two entries mention Arthur. The
first is entered under year 72, which corresponds to A.D.
518[2], and reads:

The
battle of Badon [Bellum Badonis], in which Arthur carried
the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ for three days and
three nights on his shoulders and the Britons were
victorious.[3]

This is not
the earliest document to mention the victory of the
Britons at Badon, nor the first to attribute it to Arthur.
However, it is the first to give a precise date and
duration for the battle and the first to mention
Arthurs carrying the Cross[4]. The second entry records under
year 93 (A.D. 539)

The
battle [gueith] of Camlann, in which Arthur and Medraut
fell.

This entry
has no known antecedent, and, unlike later tradition, it
does not state that Medraut was Arthurs adversary.

This
article is devoted to the obvious question: how were the
dates of these entries derived? In answering this
question, a crucial issue is when the entries were first
written. The currently accepted position is that argued
by Dumville[5], drawing on the work of Hughes[6], that the Arthurian entries were made in
the late eighth century at the earliest, the mid tenth
century at the latest. A late date of composition is
supported by the fact that the year of another entry from
the first half of the sixth century, the death of Maelgwn,
must have been calculated after 911, according to
Dumville (ibid.).

Adopting
this accepted position, the question under consideration
can be refined as follows. How would a Welsh scholar,
probably of the tenth century (but maybe of the ninth or
late eighth), have determined the date for the Arthurian
entries? In this article I will argue that they were
calculated using the historical works of Bede from around
730 and those of the British cleric, Gildas, probably
from the first half of the sixth century.

Before
turning to Gildas and Bede, it is worth pointing out that
there are no other extant sources for either of the
Arthurian dates. There are a few fleeting poetic
references to Arthur that may predate the AC, but
they shed no light on his perceived historical context[7]. This leaves only the Historia
Brittonum (HB), dated to c.829[8]. It contains a comparative wealth of
Arthurian material including a list of twelve victories
attributed to him, culminating in the battle of
Badon Hill (bellum in monte Badonis)[9]. The only common element with the text of
the AC is that Arthur was the leader of the
Britons at this battle; Camlann is not mentioned in the HB.
However, the AC may show the influence of the HB
in mentioning an icon carried on Arthurs shoulder:
in the HB, he carries an image of the Holy Virgin
on his shoulders during the eighth battle, in Guinnion
fort.

The time
frame in the HB is generally loose, and no more so
than for Arthur. His battles are inserted between the
death of Hengest, Saxon king of Kent, and the rise of Ida,
king of the Bernicians. From the earlier sections of the HB
we can reasonably suppose that the first event was
thought by the author to have occurred in the second half
of the fifth century. For example, Hengest is said (Sec.31)
to have been received by Vortigern forty years after the
end of the Roman empire in Britain. A century before the HB
was written, Bede had dated the beginning of Idas
reign as 547[10]. Even accepting these debatable limits,
the text of HB barely secures Arthurs
supposed floruit to within a century.

2.
Gildas: forty-four years before Badon or after Badon?

Since early
references to Arthur do not reveal the origin of the AC
dates, we must instead look for early material on the
battles of Badon or Camlann. There is no such material on
Camlann but for Badon we are very fortunate in having the
almost contemporary letter by the British cleric Gildas.
It assigns great significance to the siege of Badon
Hill (obsessio montis Badonicus) as the
final victory of our Country which has been granted
to our time by the will of God.[11] It is certain that Gildas polemic,
known as De Excidio Britanniae (DEB),
On the Ruin of Britain, was well read in the
early Middle Ages[12]. There is every reason to
believe that a compiler of the AC would have had a
copy before him.

Gildas
gives no dates and very few exact time-spans in his
summary of the history of Britain. On the positive side,
one of them is in conjunction with the siege of Badon
Hill. Unfortunately Gildas style is so convoluted
that the meaning of the text (Sec.26) is unclear:

From
that time on now the citizens, now the enemy, were
victorious ... right up until the year of the siege of
Badon Hill, almost the last, not the least, slaughter of
the villains, and this the forty-fourth year begins (as I
know) with one month already elapsed, which is also [that]
of my birth.

To
establish the DEB as a source for the AC date,
it is crucial to understand how a compiler of the AC
would have understood Gildas.

To begin,
it seems obvious that Gildas is saying is that he was
born in the same year as the siege of Badon Hill[14]. What is not obvious is the meaning of
the forty-fourth year[15]. One influential school of
thought[16]holds that Gildas was saying that he was
writing forty-three years and one month after Badon. I
will call this the after Badon interpretation.
A somewhat less popular opinion[17]is that Gildas was saying that
the battle of Badon took place forty-three years and one
month after some other event not named by him in this
sentence. I will call this the before Badon
interpretation.

In this
section I will establish that the before
Badon interpretation was the one likely to have
been used by the AC compiler. The only independent
evidence for how Gildas was interpreted in the early
Middle Ages is in the works of Bede. Thus it is essential
to examine how Bede understood the above passage from
Gildas.

In the Historia
Ecclesiastica Gens Anglorum (HE) Bede closely
follows Gildas in describing the fluctuating fortunes of
the Britons, and the battle of Badon:

From
that time on, now the citizens, now the enemy were
victorious right up until the year of the siege of mount
Badon, when there was no small slaughter of the enemy
about forty-four years after their arrival in Britain.[18]

Here Bede
seems to be adopting the before Badon
interpretation, in taking Gildas to mean that Badon was
in the forty-fourth year of English settlement in Britain[19]. Gildas DEB says nothing to
support Bedes use of the English advent
as marking the beginning of a new era. It may be that
Bedes own chronological framework based around the
English advent[20] influenced his interpretation of Gildas.
Alternatively, Bedes copy of the DEB, which
antedates the earliest extant manuscript by three
centuries[21], may have read differently from later
versions. Regardless of these speculations, it is clear
that Bede interpreted Gildas forty-fourth year as
being the year of his birth (and Badon Hill), not the
year of his writing.

Bedes
reading of Gildas in the before Badon way
suggests that the Welsh annalists would have done
likewise. There is further evidence for this, in that the
AC would be glaringly inconsistent if the
annalists had read Gildas the other (after
Badon) way. If Gildas was writing in the forty-fourth
year after Badon, that would have been about 561
according to the AC. But Gildas uses a
considerable portion of his letter chastising a certain
tyrant Maglocunus (Sec.33.1-2), who is universally
identified as Maelgwn, the renowned king of Gwynedd. His
death is noted in the AC under 549. Thus to remain
consistent, the annalists must have understood the forty-three
or forty-four years to be counted backwards from Badon,
not forward.

3.
Gildas: what was forty-four years before Badon?

Although
the compilers of the AC would have been familiar
with Bede[22], and agreed with his before
Badon reading of Gildas, they appear not to have
agreed with his interpretation of the era to which the
forty-fourth year belongs. If they had followed Bede and
used any of Bedes dates for the English advent they
would have calculated a date for Badon in the fifth
century, not the sixth. Therefore they must have
understood Badon to have been in the forty-fourth year of
some other era.

As a number
of authors have realized[23], this other era can be found in
the DEB itself. Immediately preceding the
Badon sentence quoted in Section 2 of this
article is the following (Sec.25.2)

After
a time, when the cruel plunderers [the Saxons]
had gone home, God gave strength to the survivors.
Wretched people fled to them from all directions .
Their leader was Ambrosius Aurelianus, a gentleman who,
perhaps alone of the Romans, had survived the shock of
this notable storm. Certainly his parents, who had worn
the purple, were slain in it. His descendants in our day
have become greatly inferior to their grandfathers
excellence. Under him our people regained their strength,
and challenged the victors to battle. The Lord assented,
and the battle went their way.

Assuming
the before Badon interpretation, it becomes
obvious what era Gildas meant. When he says (see Section
2 above) From that time on, he means from the
first victorious battle under Ambrosius. Thus when he
subsequently says the forty-fourth year he
must mean the forty-fourth year from that victory.

4.
Bedes Chronica Majora and the AC
Badon date.

Gildas does
not date Ambrosius victory, so he alone cannot
explain the 518 date in the AC. The only other
early text that mentions Ambrosius victory is Bede.
Although clearly drawing his text from Gildas, he
goes beyond his source by bracketing it within definite
dates. This is done not in the HE, but in the less
well known Chronica Majora of c. 725[24]. Under the reign of Zeno (474-91)[25] he enters the following:

The
Britons, under the leadership of Ambrosius Aurelianus (a
gentleman who, alone of the Romans, had survived the
disaster of the Saxons in which his parents, who had worn
the purple, had been killed) challenged the victors to
battle and defeated them.

In the Chronica
Majora we have finally arrived at a potential source
for the AC date for Badon. Like the HE, it
would presumably have been available to Welsh scholars
from the late eighth century[26]. Adding forty-three years to the
regnal period of Zeno gives the bracket 517x34 for the
battle of Badon. If Gildas was to have written a learned
letter before the recorded death of Maelgwn in 549, he
cannot have been thought to have been born as late as 534.
Moreover, Gildas writes in the DEB (Sec.1.2)
that

I had
decided to speak of the dangers run ... by the lazy. And
it was, I confess, with unmeasured grief at heart that I
kept silent ... as the space of ten years or more passed
by. Then, as now, my inexperience and my worthlessness
restrained me from writing any warning, however modest.

To
incorporate this extra decade or more of silence an early
date for Badon would be required. On this basis, it is
not difficult to see how the date of 518 was chosen from
the bracket 517x34. A discrepancy of one year requires no
special pleading  as noted in footnote 2, all of
the AC dates of this period are imprecise.

This
computation would make Gildas at most thirty-one at the
time of writing the DEB, which is not contradicted
by textual evidence in the DEB or elsewhere[27]. Taking the birth of Gildas to be 518
also presents no difficulty with the recorded year of his
death (572) in the AC. Finally, a period of up to
seventy-four years from Ambrosius victory to
Gildas present is entirely compatible with
Gildas criticism of Ambrosius living
grandchildren. Indeed, a period somewhat greater than two
generations would be expected given that Ambrosius
parents died (presumably prematurely) at the hands of the
Saxons in the storm that immediately preceded
the Ambrosian recovery.

One could
take the current inquiry one stage further by asking how
Bede obtained his approximate date for Ambrosius
victory. Since Bede appears to rely only upon the DEB
for these events, the only answer would seem to be by
estimation based on Gildas account. Gildas
indicates the passage of some time twice in this part of
the narrative. First, he says (Sec.22.5) that the
first granting of supplies shut the dogs
mouth (that is, satisfied the Saxons) for a
long time(multo tempore). Second, he
says (Sec.25.2) that After a time [Tempore
igitur interveniente aliquanto], when the cruel
plunderers had gone home, God gave strength to the
survivors. The HE has a long narrative
between the English advent and Ambrosius victory,
including a Saxon expedition against the Picts plus all
of Gildas story. This could easily cover the
required time span, say 450-74.

5.
Gildas and the AC Camlann date.

Having
given a likely explanation for the 518 date of the first
Arthurian entry in the AC, I turn next to the
second entry, reporting the battle at Camlann in 539.
Here there is no direct help from Bede or Gildas, as
neither mention Camlann. It is conceivable that a thrice-seven
year period between Arthurs greatest victory and
his downfall was part of the early Welsh bardic tradition
about Athur[28]. Alternatively, this tradition may have
merely associated Arthur with an extended period of peace
and order following Badon. Gildas gives contemporary
evidence for such a period in history, saying (Sec.26.2-3)
that

The
remembrance of so desperate a blow to the island [the
Saxon revolt] and of such unlooked for recovery [under
Ambrosius] stuck in the minds of those who witnessed
both wonders. That was why kings, public and private
persons, priests and churchmen, kept to their own
stations. But they died and an age succeeded them that is
ignorant of that storm and has experienced only the calm
of the present.

Evidently
those who witnessed the Saxons revolt and the
Britons turning of the tables lived into the post-Badon
calm of the present, and then died. This does
not fit poorly with Badons being some forty-four
years after those events. So for a while after the battle
of Badon, there was civil order, but this did not last
into the succeeding age, as Gildas continues

All
the controls of truth and justice have been shaken and
overthrown, leaving no trace, not even a memory among the
orders I have mentioned, with the exception of a few, a
very few.

Certainly
the Arthur of the Romances is associated with a long
period of peace and good government in Britain after the
victory of Badon Hill. This association is directly
attributable to the famous pseudo-history by Geoffrey of
Monmouth, the Historia Regum Britanniae. In this
work, written in the 1130s, Geoffrey may have been
following an earlier Welsh tradition. If so, then the end
of that period would traditionally have coincided with
the death of Arthur. But the period must have ended at
least ten years before Gildas wrote the DEB,
because that is how long Gildas says he has been silently
bemoaning the morals of his countrymen (See section 4
above). To make the period of Arthurs peace as long
(and hence as glorious) as possible, the annalist would
have placed Gildas writing of the DEB as
late as possible, just before Maelgwns death.
Subtracting ten years from 549 gives a date for the
battle of Camlann of 539, as we find in the AC.

6.
Potential counter-arguments.

There are
two obvious counter-arguments that could be made to the
case I have presented here. The first would be founded on
the denial that Bede interpreted Gildas forty-four
years as being before Badon. This was the stand taken by
Plummer[29]. He claimed that the coincidence of the
figure of forty-four years in Gildas and Bede is just
that, a mere coincidence. As Myres[30]argued, this is hard to believe.
Everything Bede knew about Badon came directly from
Gildas. It seems just too unlikely that, when writing
about Badon, he would also use the figure of forty-four
years, but with a completely different and independent
meaning.

Recently
Sims-Williams[31] has resurrected Plummers argument
by suggesting that Bede, drawing on Gildas, had estimated
that the battle of Badon took place in about 500. With
this nice round figure in mind, Bede (according to Sims-Williams)
then calculated this to be about forty-four years
after the English advent in 456. This date for the
English advent is the latest possible date in Bedes
bracket of 449x456.

There are a
number of problems with Sims-Williams argument. The
first is that nowhere else in the HE does Bede use
456 as a date for the English advent; as noted in
footnote 20, if anything he tends to favour a date prior
to 449. Sims-Williams explains this by hypothesizing that
in transcribing Gildas history (Bk.1, cc.XIII-XVI),
Bede must have had in mind a date for the English advent
around 456, but revised this backwards by a decade after
having written his account (Bk.I, cc.XVII-XXI) of St.
Germanus visits to Britain. However, there is no
evidence that Bede ever favoured a date around 456. To
the contrary, in the Chronica Majora, written
about five years before the HE, he already dates
the English advent, as in the later sections of the HE
(Bk.2, c.XIV), to about 447[32].

Secondly,
although it is true that Bede often dates events from the
English advent approximately (circiter), nowhere
else in the HE does he quote the number of
intervening years in anything other than multiples of
five. The forty-four years is an anomaly unless it was
derived from Gildas.

Finally,
Bede was usually a cautious historian, as Sims-Williams
himself notes[33]. Even modern historians, with the benefit
of other (especially continental) material, have found it
impossible to construct an absolute chronology from
Gildas narrative. It is therefore hard to see why
Bede would think it worth attempting to date the battle
of Badon to the nearest year (even if only approximately),
unless he was influenced by Gildas forty-four years.
As discussed in Section 4, when Bede dated
Ambrosius victory (another event known only from
the DEB) he showed his usual caution by bracketing
it within a long imperial reign.

The second
potential counter-argument to my suggestion that Bede and
Gildas inspired the AC compilers dating of
Badon is an old claim, recently restated by Padel, that
in the DEB (and presumably also in the HE),
Mount Badon reads naturally as the victory which
crowned the career of Ambrosius Aurelianus.[34] If this were the only natural reading,
then it might make it unlikely for a Welsh chronicler to
have used Gildas and Bede to date the battle while
contradicting them by crediting the victory to Arthur.

To rebut
this criticism it is necessary only to point the reader
to the text of Gildas and Bede as quoted above to see
that neither associate Ambrosius with this battle at all.
They associate him with the victory that began the period
of fluctuating conflict, but are simply silent as to the
leader at Badon Hill. Furthermore, if we accept,
following the AC chronicler, the before
Badon reading of Gildas, then it would be rather
unlikely for Ambrosius still to be the British commander
forty-three years after his initial victory. Finally,
there is no particular reason to expect Gildas to have
identified the victorious leader at Badon at all. In all
of the history which follows the death of Magnus Maximus[35], Gildas mentions as individuals only two
persons from Britain, and names only one of them (Ambrosius)[36]. There would thus have been no reason
derivable from Bede or Gildas for a compiler of the AC
not to allow Arthur the victory at Badon Hill.

7.
Discussion: the significance of the AC
dates.

To conclude,
this study has suggested a likely derivation of the
earliest Arthurian dates on record, those in the Annales
Cambriae, from the earlier works of Gildas and Bede.
For the next dated record of Arthur we have to jump to
Geoffrey of Monmouth. One of only three dates which he
supplies in his Historia Regum Britanniae is that
for the death of Arthur: 542[37]. The other two dates, the death
of King Lucius in 156 and the death of Cadwalladr in 689,
are probably both derived from the HE (although
they both involve a significant misreading of it[38]). An inventive hypothesis by Ashe not
withstanding[39], it is safe to say that the only
plausible written source for the date of the battle of
Camlann is the AC. The three-year discrepancy is
not a significant problem. As noted above, the intended AC
dates at this time are all uncertain by a few years[40].

Geoffreys
enormous popularity ensured that the AC chronology
for Arthur became the accepted one for many centuries.
This occurred through the works of chroniclers such as
Roger of Wendover[41]. It is possible that Roger was
also influenced directly by the AC. He places the
battle of Camlann in 541 (but Arthurs
doubtful death in 542, as in Geoffrey), and
the battle of Badon in 520. That is, he follows the AC
in putting Badon exactly twenty-one years before Camlann.
This is in contrast to Geoffrey who puts Badon an
uncertain number of years (but certainly more than twenty-one)
before Camlann[42].

The general
acceptance of the approximate AC chronology in
Mediaeval and Early Modern times says nothing, of course,
for its veracity. If my above arguments are correct, it
was derived principally from Gildas, Bedes
guesswork based upon Gildas, and the 549 AC date
for the death of Maelgwn[43]. The battle of Badon Hill was
certainly a real and significant event (whether the
leader of the Britons was named Arthur or not), and it is
possible that there was an historical battle of Camlann
also. But unless startling new evidence is uncovered[44], we can only guess at the true dates of
these battles, and hope not to be wrong by not too many
generations[45].

* I gratefully acknowledge correspondence
with Thomas Green of Exeter College, Oxford, and Oliver
Padel, Cambridge. The greater part of this article
appeared previously as The derivation of the date
of the Badon entry in the Annales Cambriae from
Bede and Gildas, Parergon 17, 1 (2000),
available from my site: http://www.cit.gu.edu.au/~s285238/DECB/ParergonArticle.pdf[1] J. Morris (editor and translator), British
History and the Welsh Annals, (London: Phillimore,
1980).[2] The dates intended for the earlier AC
entries can be determined only approximately. The annals
are organized in decades, but occasionally there are too
few, occasionally too many, years per decade (Morris, ibid.).
Moreover, where they can be checked against more reliable
external sources, the number of years between entries can
be in error by up to five years, such as where the AC
count thirteen years from the death of Cadwallon (634) to
the death of Oswald (642). For the sixth century dates I
quote here I am following the reckoning of L. Alcock, Arthur's
Britain (London: Penguin, 1971), pp.39,49. This
appears to give the best agreement between the AC
and other sources, from the birth of St. Columba in 523
to the (beginning of the) conversion of the English in
597. Other reckonings (Morris, ibid.) date these
entries some two years earlier, but this has no
substantive effect on the arguments I present below.[3] This quotation of, and subsequent
references to, the AC use the version in J. Morris,
ibid.[4] There need be nothing miraculous about
this deed. As discussed below, it may refer merely to the
carrying of an image of the Cross.[5] D.N. Dumville, Sub-Roman Britain:
history and legend, History, N.S., 62 (London,
1977), 345-354 (p.176).[6] K.W. Hughes, The Annales
Cambriae and Related Texts, Proc. British
Academy, 59 (1973), 233-58.[7] P. Sims-Williams, The Early Welsh
Poems, The Arthur of the Welsh, edited by R.
Bromwich, A.O.H. Jarman and B.F. Roberts (Cardiff:
University of Wales, 1991), 33-72.[8] D.N. Dumville, Some aspects of the
chronology of the Historia Brittonum', Bulletin
of the Board of Celtic Studies, 25 (Cardiff, 1972-74),
439-445 (pp.439-440).[9] J. Morris, ibid. Sec.56.[10]Historia Ecclesiastica Gens Anglorum
Bk. 5, c. XXIV.[11] Sec.2 of the translation by M.
Winterbottom, Gildas: The Ruin of Britain and other
documents (London: Phillimore, 1978). Except where
indicated, all subsequent quotations will be taken from
this edition.[12] This is true even outside Wales: as will
be discussed, Bede relied upon it heavily.[13] Partly following Winterbottom ibid.
and partly following T.D. OSullivan, The De
Excidio of Gildas: its Authenticity and Date (Leiden:
Brill, 1978), p.134. [14] For a contrary view see I. Wood,
The End of Roman Britain: Continental evidence and
parallels Gildas: New Approaches (Boydell:
Suffolk, 1984), 1-25 (p.23).[15] For a review of arguments to the mid-1970s,
see chapter VII of T.D. OSullivan, ibid.[16] including D.N. Dumville, The
chronology of De Excidio, book I, Gildas:
New Approaches, 61-84 (pp.76-77); and P. Sims-Williams,
Gildas and the Anglo-Saxons, Cambridge
Medieval Celtic Studies, 6 (1983), 1-30 (pp.1,4).[17] held, for example by T.D. OSullivan,
ibid. and I. Wood, ibid.[18] Bk.1, c. XVI, following M.
Winterbottoms (ibid.) translation of the
corresponding passage in the DEB.[19] T.D. OSullivan, ibid., p.156
and I. Wood, ibid have argued that Bede actually
interpreted Gildas as placing Badon in the forty-fourth
year after Ambroisus victory (see Section 3), but
that he thought that this victory was close in time to
the English arrival. However, Bede actually dated these
two events some decades apart in his earlier work the Chronica
Majora and also includes a long narrative in the HE
between these events (see Section 4 of this article).[20] When Bede relates the first arrival of
the English (Bk.1, c.XV) he places it during the seven
year joint imperium of Marcian and Valentinian, which he
dates as 449-456 (actually 450-457). Elsewhere, when he
gives the passage of time from the English advent to
other events, he implies a date of c.445 (Bk.1, c.XXIII),
c.447 (Bk.2, c.XIV) or c.446 (Bk.5, c.XXIII).[21] M. Winterbottom, ibid., p.12.[22] He is described in the Welsh triads (number
49 from the Red book of Hergest) as being one of the
three men who received the wisdom of Adam. Acceptance of
Bede would have been likely only after 768, the year that
the Welsh church was reconciled to the Catholic placement
of Easter. As discussed, it is unlikely that the
Arthurian entries in the AC were made before then.[23] See T.D. OSullivan, ibid. (pp.
141, 155).[24] This work, along with the HE, is
translated and edited by J. McClure and R. Collins in Bede
(Oxford: Oxford University, 1994).[25] This translation follows M.
Winterbottoms (ibid.) translation of the
corresponding passage in the DEB.[26] Although there is no record of its early
circulation in England, let alone Wales, according to J.
McClure and R. Collins ibid., p.xxvii.[27] T.D. OSullivan, ibid., pp.146-155.[28] See Sims-Williams in R. Bromwich, A.O.H.
Jarman and B.F. Roberts, ibid. [29] C. Plummer, Venerabilis Baedae Opera
Historica II (Oxford: Clarendon, 1896.), p.31.[30] R.G. Collingwood and J.N.L. Myres, Roman
Britain and The English settlements (Oxford:
Clarendon, 1937), n.1 on p.461.[31] P. Sims-Williams, The settlement of
England in Bede and the Chronicle, Anglo-Saxon
England, 12 (1983), 1-41 (pp.20-21).[32] Bede, Chronica Majora, under the
reign of Heraclius (4591-). [33] P. Sims-Williams, The settlement of
England in Bede and the Chronicle (p.19).[34] O.J. Padel, The Nature of
Arthur, Cambrian Medieval Celtic Studies, 27
(1994), 1-31 (p.17).[35] That is, a period of perhaps a century
and a half from 388.[36] The other is the proud tyrant
identified by Bede as Vortigern.[37] Geoffrey of Monmouth, The History of
the Kings of Britain, translated by L. Thorpe (Middlesex:
Penguin, 1966), last line of Part 7 (p.261).[38] In the first case, Bede actually says
that Lucius wrote to Pope Eleutherius during the reign of
Marcus Antoninus Verus, which began in 156. In the second,
Bede records the death of Caedwalla, King of the West
Saxons, not Cadwalladr, King of the Britons, in 688.[39] G. Ashe,  A certain very
ancient book: Traces of an Arthurian Source in
Geoffrey of Monmouths History, Speculum
56 (1981), 301-23 (pp.316-8). He claims that the original
of Geoffreys Arthur was Riothamus, an undoubtably
historical king of the Britons who campaigned in Gaul on
behalf of the dying Western Empire but was defeated by
the Visigoths in c.470. Ashe suggests that the obit
of Riothamus/Arthur was recorded in some lost chronicle
as 442 (invoking a confusion of the Nativity and Passion
of Christ), and that Geoffrey amended this to 542 as he
knew 442 to be too early. The scholarly consensus is that
there is little to recommend any of Ashes theory;
see for example R.W. Hanning, Inventio Arthuri:
a comment on the essays of Geoffrey Ashe and D. R.
Howlett in Arthuriana 5.3 (1995), pp.96-100.[40] Moreover, Geoffrey might have been
influenced to adjust the AC Camlann date forwards
by his identification of the death of Caedwalla, in 688
or 689 with the death of Cadwalladr, which was recorded
in the AC for the year circa 683.[41] Roger of Wendover, Flowers of History,
translated by J.A. Giles (New York: AMS Press, 1968), Vol.1,
pp.34-43.[42] Roger saves a number of years by
telescoping Geoffreys two Arthurian expeditions to
Gaul into one.[43] As noted above, Dumville argues that this
was derived in the 10th century, and more specifically by
an annalist who assumed that Maelgwn died in the great
plague of c. 549 recorded in the Annals of Ulster.[44] Such evidence, dating Badon to 496, is
claimed in D.R. Howlett, Cambro-Latin compositions:
their competence and craftsmanship (Dublin: Four
Courts Press, 1998). I have argued elsewhere (H. Wiseman,
Book Review: The Dates for Gildas and Badon in Cambro-Latin
Compositions: Their Competence and Craftsmanship by
David Howlett, to appear in The Heroic Age http://www.mun.ca/mst/heroicage/) that this claim has no basis.[45] At least one recent historian must be
wrong by more than a generation regarding the date of the
battle of Badon. N. Higham, The English Conquest:
Gildas and Britain in the fifth century (Manchester:
Manchester University Press, 1994), p.137 dates it to 436x41.
This is about eighty years prior to the date of 519
suggested (on a basis independent from the AC) by
V.I. Evison, The Fifth-Century Invasions South of the
Thames (London: Athlone Press, 1965), pp.18-21.
Highams guess is exceptionally early, so a date
around 500, as often used in general history
texts, is probably reasonable, if interpreted as 480x520.